The Spiritual Boxer Part II [茅山殭屍拳] (1979)
AKA The Shadow Boxing

Starring Wong Yu, Gordon Liu Chia-Hui, Cecilia Wong Hang-Sau, Lau Kar-Wing, Lee Hoi-Sang, Norman Tsui Siu-Keung, Wilson Tong, Wong Ching-Ho, Shum Lo, Ou-Yang Sha-Fei, Cheung Chok-Chow, Keung Hon

Directed by Lau Kar-Leung

Expectations: Curious to see how Lau’s approach to spiritual boxing has changed since his debut.

Any fan of Hong Kong movies knows that a sequel isn’t always a sequel in Hong Kong. Many sequels use similar premises as their hopping-off point, but don’t continue the story of the original. Along these same lines is Hong Kong’s loose definition of the remake, where a spiritual successor sometimes carries the same Chinese title with an attached year (such as Police Story 2013). The case of The Spiritual Boxer Part II is a sort of bridge between all available options. Despite the English title, it’s not technically a sequel to The Spiritual Boxer as no story elements or characters recur. The Chinese title is also completely different — the first film is 神打 (translating to something like God Hits [the character inhabits personas of Gods when fighting]), while Part II is 茅山殭屍拳 (translating to Mao Shan Jiangshi Fist, as in the martial arts style from Mt. Mao, one of the most important places in Taoism, of the Chinese hopping zombie/vampire).

Looking at the broad foundations of the two films’ stories, though, they do share the basics of an apprentice Taoist (played by Wong Yu in both films) bungling his way through taking over his master’s business. The master’s role and how the apprentice achieves their goal is wildly different, but it feels like the type of connection that would warrant a 神打 ’79 title in later years*. In any case, I feel that Lau Kar-Leung and screenwriter Ni Kuang were consciously making a spiritual sequel to Lau’s debut film. The official English title from 1979 is The Spiritual Boxer Part II after all, even if Celestial changed it to The Shadow Boxing in all remastered versions.

Where the first film focuses on a spiritual conman, The Spiritual Boxer Part II literally asks you to suspend your skepticism in the folk beliefs that Taoist priests could control jiangshi and “corpse herd” them from town to town. Looking back it seems odd to ask this of the audience, as every current HK movie fan has seen at least one (or one ton) of jiangshi films, but in 1979 this was a novel concept**. Lau’s film pre-dates Sammo Hung’s 1980 film Encounters of the Spooky Kind (which is generally considered the starting point for the HK vampire craze) and Ricky Lau’s 1985 film Mr. Vampire (the genre megahit that spawned countless imitators). But Lau Kar-Leung was there first, and there’s no way to watch The Spiritual Boxer Part II without seeing how indebted to him both Sammo and Ricky Lau’s films are. The Spiritual Boxer Part II hopped so Mr. Vampire could hop further, if you will.

It’s a bold move to cast Gordon Liu as a jiangshi. It becomes clear fairly early on that he’s just a man posing as a jiangshi, but he’s a huge star just hopping around for most of the movie! The Spiritual Boxer Part II is a Gordon Liu time bomb; when will the kung fu explode? As you expect, it explodes in beautifully crafted, precise Lau Kar-Leung style, but the addition of Lau’s unique Jiangshi Fist style creates fights that are unlike anything in the Hong Kong industry at the time. If I saw this in 1979, without ever seeing a jiangshi film, I’d have lost my damn mind. The inclusion of Lau’s brother Lau Kar-Wing as the master elevates the martial display over the first film, too. His fight in the inn, with Wong Yu jiangshi-ing his way up and down the stairs is a fantastic bit, and it reminds me more of ’80s HK choreography than its ’70s brethren. It felt like a direct ancestor of the ’80s kung fu comedies that cemented my love of HK cinema almost 30 years ago. That being said, the choreography isn’t on par with his previous film Heroes of the East, or really any of his main classics, but it’s important to remember that an artist must not always top himself. A lateral move in a different direction is more than enough sometimes.

As much as I liked The Spiritual Boxer Part II, it does suffer from seeing it after years of watching jiangshi films. The story and the comedy aren’t as sharp as the first Spiritual Boxer (or Sammo and Ricky Lau’s films, for that matter), but it remains remarkable entertainment despite this. The action is well beyond what is seen in The Spiritual Boxer, and the two films combine to make an interesting document of Lau Kar-Leung’s progression and evolution as a choreographer in the four years between them. The Spiritual Boxer is the better overall movie, but Part II is more enjoyable and I’m much more inclined to re-watch it. If you haven’t seen either, you definitely should!

Additional note: According to the listing in The Shaw Screen, Cantonese was the original production language of The Spiritual Boxer Part II. Unfortunately, only Mandarin is available on the DVD/streaming versions currently available.

* As far as I can tell in searching HKMDB, this practice didn’t start until the ’80s with Call Girl ’88, which appended the year to the Chinese title of the 1973 film The Call Girls).

** In researching pre-1979 jiangshi films (this list was very helpful), I came upon the Cantonese film The Voyage of the Dead [萬里行屍] (1954), that not only features a Taoist priest herding jiangshi, but there’s a man hiding amongst the dead! The synopsis I read bears other similarities to The Spiritual Boxer Part II, so it’s possible Ni Kuang & Lau Kar-Leung got some inspiration from this film. The whole film is on YouTube so maybe I’ll watch it and compare. It’s not every day you discover an available HK film from the 1950s!

Next up in this chronological journey through the Shaw Brothers Martial Arts catalog is the first of Chang Cheh’s FIVE 1979 films, Life Gamble! See ya then (hopefully soon)!